September 02, 2003
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Order 500 Low-Carb Recipes from Amazon.ComSlim Fast Sales Way Down
Cue the Evil Laugh: Muahahahahahahahahaha!
Unilever, the humongous Anglo-Dutch conglomerate that makes Slim Fast shakes and bars, reports that sales of its sugary meal replacement products are way, way off -- and blames low carb dieting. Indeed, sales have dropped a reported 13% in the past year. Indeed, Unilever is unhappy enough about the performance of the Slim Fast line that they're slashing sales forecasts overall for 2003.
In the meanwhile, sales of Atkins products increased a whopping 95% between January and May this year. I'm not a big fan of basing one's low carb diet on specialty products -- I think we should all be focusing our diets on meat, poultry, fish, eggs, cheese, and vegetables -- but I'd sure rather see people drinking Atkins shakes than Slim Fast, which is simply loaded with sugar. How much sugar? The Dark Chocolate Fudge variety has 45 grams of carbohydrate in a can, 35 grams of which are pure sugar. That's over 8 teaspoons of sugar, or just two fewer than a can of Coke. Yes, the Slim Fast has vitamins added, but there's just no excuse for all that sugar. This is roughly the equivalent of a glass of chocolate milk and a vitamin pill.
Unilever does plan to fight back, by the way. How? By advertising how much "healthier" their products are than those "dangerous" low carb diets.
Yeah, right. Think it'll work?
Let me say that if I have play some small part in the torpedoing of Unilever's market for their sugar garbage posing as "healthy options," I'm proud. Proud, I tell you!!